The News Industry Could Learn a Thing or Two from Netflix
A bundling service may be the only way to save this industry
Pre-internet, the business model for the news industry was straightforward. Journalists wanted to reach as may readers as possible, and advertisers wanted to reach as many potential customers as possible.
The alignment — reach as many [readers and potential customers] as possible — was obvious, and profitable for the publishers in particular.
— Ben Thompson, Stratechery
However, even though the Internet has given publishers theoretical access to all the millions of eyeballs on the Internet, it has also set their readers loose. Companies like Google and Facebook can give advertisers something even more valuable than a big audience — a specific one.
From 2008 to 2015, newspaper ad revenue declined 61%. Over the same period, the news industry collectively reduced the number of journalists from 68,160 to 41,400. Print ad revenue will likely never recover and no digital revenue stream has yet been able to make up for its loss.
